scienceing:

mybluedecember:

princess-munchkin:

How the fuck does Bill Nye expect this to happen? What do you want to do, force women to enroll in science courses, regardless of whether or not they want to do it? Just for the sake of having “enough” women? Why the fuck do these fractions matter so much? It’s not like people are holding guns to our head and threatening to kill us if we become interested in science.

Maybe, just maybe, a lot of us DON’T FUCKING WANT to be scientists. Is that a crime?

Hi there, princess-munchkin. Female engineering student here. 

Bill Nye is not saying that you HAVE to be a scientist, and you are right that no one is holding a gun to my head because I am interested in science, but let me tell you some of the struggles of being a woman in the STEM fields. 

1) Because I am a woman, I am not expected these fields. I first fully realized this when I was in high school, on my robotics team. See, although my robotics team was about 50% female, most of the women were part of the “business administration” side of things: finance, marketting, PR, membership, etc. Was this a problem? Absolutely not. But I was there to be an engineer, and specifically, to be the robot programmer. This was met with a lot of hesitation at first from some of the other students (all of whom happened to be male. This is not necessarily a bad thing.) You see, all of the robot programmers before me were guys. Computer programming is just a thing that guys do, or so they thought. Even after I had proved myself to the mentors on the team, many of the students still underestimated my abilities. There were rumors going around that I wouldn’t have been able to program the robot at all if the lead software mentor wasn’t there to help me. This was just flat-out false, but it wasn’t until I won an award for the team that the other students actually saw my merit. 

2) There is not a lot of encouragement for women to go into these fields. I first noticed this when I was in elementary school. I was always interested in math, science, you name it, but many of my teachers and family members pushed that to the side for a long time. When I asked for legos for christmas, I would get ballet slippers. In fact, for a long time, I was training to be a professional dancer. I loved to dance. I loved math more, but no one seemed to notice that about me. It wasn’t until I had a long conversation with one particular teacher in high school that I decided to look into engineering. I had never even considered it as an option before, because no one decided to encourage me to pursue my interest in science. If it hadn’t been for that teacher, I would probably not be at the school I am at right now. 

3) For a long time, Engineering/Science/Math WAS a “boys only” club. Let me tell you when some of the top technical schools and societies started letting women in:

• RPI, The oldest tech school in the country, founded in 1824. Started admitting women in 1942 to “replace men called to war.” Campus housing for women wasn’t constructed until 1966. 
• Tau Beta Pi, the Engineering Honors Society - Founded in 1885. Started admitting women in 1968.
• Caltech - Currently rated #3 in undergraduate engineering. Founded in 1891. Started admitting women in 1970. 
• Georgia Tech - Currently rated #5 in undergraduate engineering. Founded in 1885. Started admitting women in 1952. 

Do you see the implications of this? Engineering has been a part of our society since around the late 1800s (in the case of RPI, since the 1820s), but women weren’t even allowed in for the most part until the 1950s, regardless of their merit. 

4) Because of the fact that it was a “boys only” club for such a long time, there are not a lot of women engineers and scientists to look up to. When you’re reading your physics, chemistry, and math text books, the majority of those theories were came up with by men. It is true that much of our history was written by White Men, but this does not mean that the fact that there are few women scientists to look up does not matter. 

So, as you can hopefully see, princess-munckin, or anyone else that shares the opinions of princess-munchkin, Bill Nye was not arguing that women that are not interested in STEM should go into those fields anyway. But he IS arguing against all of the systematic barriers set up against women who ARE interested in engineering and science. There are several women out there who are just as good as the boys at math and science, but will never pursue their interests because it just doesn’t seem like an option. That was me for a long time. I am super grateful for the fact that I fought against that, and that I ended up where I am. 

if you don’t like science, fine. Don’t be a scientist. But if one day you have a daughter and she shows interest in being a scientist, PLEASE encourage her. Because Bill Nye is right, there needs to be more women scientists in the world. 

A+ comment

morhek:

Randall Monroe, XKCD

bigbardafree:

dance-tunes-to-fail-to:

thegoddamazon:

and-rohan-will-answer:

ten0uttaten:

that-kid-matt-biller:

whenthefire-dies:

furose:

grimyboy:

HOW THE FUCK ARE THESE BABIES SWIMMING I AM 21 AND CANNOT SWIM THIS IS SOME FUCK SHIT

Babies instinctively know when to hold their breathes!
Babies are amazing

what

WHAT THE HELL IS THIS!? I HAVE TO HOLD MY NOSE AND THIS BABY DOESN’T HAVE TOO!? 

What shitty parent discovered this

babies are naturally able to swim hello they just spent nine moths in amiotic fluid this is instinctive so no, parent is not shitty, parent is re-enforcing baby’s natural instinctive behaviour.

parent is good for doing this because parent is basically saying “yes the behaviours you were born with are great!”

Also helps condition the babies so they don’t build up a fear of swimming in deep water that is prevalent in a lot of people later on.

This is interesting but I’d never do it.

my mother did this with me

londonprophecy:

sa7o:

The first bionic hand that allows an amputee to feel what they are touching will be transplanted later this year in a pioneering operation that could introduce a new generation of artificial limbs with sensory perception.

so it begins

uss-gallifrey:

4gifs:

Scent of a sharpie marker traps ants by disrupting their pheromone trails [video]

i love how ants are like the only creature you can literally play god with.

jtotheizzoe:

whisperingwordsofwisdom:

General Relativity in 8 gifs

Reblog every time.

Relatively awesome.

ikenbot:

Baku Analemma

One full year of solar motion is captured in this multi-exposure analemma image from shore of the Caspian Sea in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Image by Tunc Tezel

Analemma is the figure “8” loop that results when one observes the position of the sun at the same time of day over the course of a year. The 23.5° tilt of the earth’s axis of rotation and its elliptical orbit about the sun result in the apparent change in the sun’s location in the sky when observed at the same location at the same time of day over a year’s time.

For this image the photos are all made during the local noon. The highest point shows the sun near the day of Summer Solstice (June 21) and the lowest marks the shortest days near the Winter Solstice (Dec. 21).

moonjunk:

Prince Rupert Drops, or Dutch Tears, were actually first produced in Germany in 1625, and were a popular party trick at the end of the 17th century.

The “drops” are formed by dripping molten glass into cold water, where the exterior of the drop cools quickly while the interior remains hot significantly longer, creating internal stress in the finished drop. As a result the bulbous end of the drop is extremely strong, but even slight damage to the tail end causes the drop to explode (as pictured) at a speed of up to 4200 miles per hour.

Read More

my-pocket-universe:

Favourite Walter moments: Dr. Walter Bishop and science. 
- Fringe 4x7 “Wallflower”

flowence:

Before bloom & once bloomed

hoya bella - Shooting Star